Carla Marinucci got her hands on a very interesting memo from the California Republican Party's chairman Ron Nehring today laying out their 2010 strategy. In it, they call Democrats Jerry Brown and Barbara Boxer "lazy" - perhaps because Republicans have forgotten what it's like to have a full-time job:
This week Jerry Brown and Barbara Boxer, both of whom have clear shots at their party's nomination and therefore no primary campaign, have experienced first hand what happens when your campaign gets lethargic.
Is laziness a campaign strategy? Brown has not yet bothered to formally declare himself a candidate for Governor, and national Democrats are so concerned about his 'campaign' that the Democratic Governors Association is planning an independent expenditure campaign to bail him out.
What Nehring doesn't mention is that Brown is the sitting Attorney General and Barbara Boxer is in the middle of some of the most important legislation considered by the Senate in some time (health care and climate change). So they do have other obligations.
Now that being said, Brown IS stupid to wait so long to launch his campaign, both formally and in practice. Meg Whitman has a ton of money to spend blanketing the state with ads; you'd think Brown would want to start introducing himself to a new generation of Californians, including my peers who were born during his last time in office, and espouse his vision for California's future. Boxer, on the other hand, has been campaigning hard for her re-election for years now, so Nehring is just spewing bullshit there.
Nehring's email does raise some of the questions we've been discussing here at Calitics for a few months now. As we see further and extremely alarming signs of anger and lack of motivation from Democratic voters, such as the stunning fact the special election to replace Ted Kennedy is a toss-up, California Democrats do need to take very seriously the possibility that their base may not show up in sufficient numbers this November.
Both Brown and Boxer will run very energetic campaigns. And Boxer, for her part, knows how to win in close elections in California, and has nearly 20 years of experience showing progressives that she is one of their most important allies. Boxer and activists alike will have to work hard to win, but I doubt there will be any problem getting that work to happen.
Brown has the much bigger problem with base motivation, as we've explained repeatedly here at Calitics. Right now, Brown doesn't offer anything obvious to progressive voters to get them very excited about his campaign. As we're witnessing in Massachusetts, or last November in New Jersey and Virginia, fear of a right-winger can only do so much to motivate the base to work to win. To put a Democrat over the top, both the activist base and the infrequent voters that were vital to Obama's big 2008 win have to see something compelling in the candidate. Right now, Brown isn't offering that. (And no, pictures of you when you were a kid in the 1940s don't count.)
The Democrat who best deals with the growing frustration and alienation of the voters they need to win will be the Democrat to prove Nehring wrong. |
